


Synecdoche

by Schmengie



Series: Synecdoche/Concomitant [1]
Category: RWBY
Genre: Abandonment, Aftermath of Violence, Heavy Angst, Other, Post-Loss, Poverty, Regret
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-09
Updated: 2019-12-09
Packaged: 2021-02-25 22:01:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,351
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21562663
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Schmengie/pseuds/Schmengie
Summary: She had One Thing...
Series: Synecdoche/Concomitant [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1566754
Kudos: 7





	Synecdoche

**Author's Note:**

> This section last updated on **09 December, 2019**
> 
> Writ based on an applied dichotomy of two songs and, by extension, the words they invoke. Both are composed by the sombre hand of [Anton Belov](https://antonbelov.bandcamp.com/) of [HELENGARD](https://helengard.bandcamp.com/) and [KAUAN](https://kauan.bandcamp.com) fame. The first is called, ["Synecdoche"](https://antonbelov.bandcamp.com/track/synecdoche-2).  
>    
>  _n._  
>    
>  _a figure of speech in which a part is made to represent the whole or vice versa._

Roars. Explosions. Screams.

The sound of a whole kingdom, masticated alive.

Neopolitan had taken some cursory pleasure in it before, despite herself; yet, now, as she lay wounded in the detritus of a fallen building by the coastline, she stared almost disinterestedly at the the starry nighttime veil. Not a cloud stained it, but none needed to; the Grimm saw to the splotching of what would otherwise have been such a serene blanket. Griffons and nevermores screeched death-song as they flew about and clawed and bit away at what was left of the disarrayed Atlesian fleet, deployed so conspicuously and impulsively on the whims of a war hawk and his sense of what "security" and "safety" meant. The sounds of more inhuman monsters echoed through the mercy-crying streets and the ruins of dreary, night-painted buildings, together with the familiar noise of Atlesian plasma shot resounding with such rapidity that it seemed to drone.

She shut her two brown eyes tightly as another wave of excruciation washed over her left shoulder. By griffon claw, it had been rent open on the way down from the chaotic skies, her cropped white-pink jacket having offered no defence. It hurt and bled and stained cloth and cold, broken concrete alike.

She opened her eyes again, they a pale pink to the disconcertingly bleary scene of doubles. The whirlwind of sable splotches became all the more disorienting—and the pain...

It was not a kind she had felt for a long time. She had seen to that for _his_ sake.

She swallowed. Her heart quickened as dark-circled, weary, ghost-white eyes wandered again to the distant command airship looming over the other side of city—the one on which she had been ready to execute that annoying Little Red not half an hour ago. That deceptively shrewd girl who, after Neo had spent all of their fight on that giant flight deck kicking her around, "won" with the mere press of a button.

Neo was mortified. Her own parasol, made to carry her to what was almost her death! Her acrobatic abilities had been completely nulled as she floated down through the fell frenzy, completely at the mercy of the prevailing winds. How very dumb! Stupid! Of all the things...!

... But what about Roman? She thought she had heard him call after her when she flew away, but nothing had been intelligible inside the cacophonous torrent of roars and burning ships cannoning down to slag the city below. That she was even alive to consider it was nonsensical, but not unwelcome, for Roman needed her. He had a bad habit of getting in deep with the wrong people in pursuit of his get-rich-quick schemes and she had, time and again, been compelled to step in and bail him out with foot; Imagination; and, as necessity demanded, the seldom-shown secrets of Hush. Her muse, of all people, had to be an utter dum-dum.

 _Her_ dum-dum.

Her near-soundless breath caught in her throat as that thought froze in her mind. The flaming command ship listed in the distance. She could just barely make out the tiny explosions breaking out like horrible disease upon the characteristically Atlesian sleekness of its charcoal-detailed silver-white hull that absorbed the eventide. The orange-red discharges very faintly illuminated the blackened pestilence of viciously flapping Grimm forms and immediately, she was taken by a great unease. 

Had he made it off? Had Little Red escaped _again?_

Or was he...? 

Holding on to her still-bleeding shoulder, she slowly willed herself up from the rubble, barely-audible pain escaping through her uneven breaths. Her body was more exhausted than she had realised and her left arm uselessly slumped and hung as she took an awkward step through the broken building, feeling for stable ground. Her left hand, retaining modicums of its usual strength, instinctively squeezed the pink, folded canopy of her parasol as she felt pebbles shift beneath her dirtied, white, haphazardly-laced, knee-high heel boots.

A muted gasp escaped her. Her right quads suddenly shrieked in agony and fresh blood flowed forth from an unnoticed wound there, staining her denim-textured brown leggings. Her eyes rolled back for a split second as she stumbled. She stabbed Hush in to a concrete slab to catch herself, but it slipped. Nothing about her—her diminutive stature; feathery body; or her typically airy, self-confident disposition—came to her aid. 

She lost her balance and fell to her knees. The rubble beneath her shifted, gave way, and sent her tumbling down a slope of jagged debris, her small body painting it with fresh crimson micropools and smears. Her black-gloved fingers slammed against spurious earth and Hush slipped from them, clanking and crinkling to pitfalls elsewhere.

She burst hard through one last pile of rubbish and rolled to a halt upon cold, hard pavement. Little bits and pieces followed her there and, face-down, she gasped through the sheer pain of what had been a mere two seconds.

Many more would pass as she lay, her eyelids fluttering exhaustedly over orbs of transient chromia. She felt tiny grains and pebbles in her wounds.

That's right... her _wounds_...

A blurring. A darkening. Muffled cries and the evil throats of soulless monstrosities in the distance. Clanking metal.

Pain. Suffering. Desperation. 

The inviting hand of death.

Love. Hope. 

_Roman._

Gritting her teeth, she propped herself upon an aching elbow, refusing to submit to the coming torpor. The Grimm would find her easy prey in the middle of this road and she could hear the otherworldly cawing of the nevermores drawing closer. She was thankful that she wasn't the only distressed soul in this city or they would probably have arrived to tear her asunder by now.

On elbow and knee, she crawled towards the obscuration of a darkened alley. Her quads _screamed_ at her. Wincing, she held her breath. _How_ had she managed not to notice the pain of it until now?

Getting her upper body over the sidewalk curb, she rolled sideways for the remaining distance. Propping herself up with her good arm and shoulder, she rested her back on the building wall, her breath escaping her in a huff she wasn't aware she could make. She clenched her fists and heaved a bit, as if her body itself thought it could simply _breathe_ the pain away. She surveyed her surroundings, but there wasn't much to see. Looking to her left, she saw Hush sticking and listing out of a pile of rubble, mercifully at the inside edge of the ruined building in which she had been moments ago. Good. It would be easy enough to pick it up once she wasn't on the veritable verge of a coma.

A distant explosion.

She looked to her front to see the command ship, its hull an infernal assemblage of bright, yellow-red trails peppered in ejected scrap as it groaned down towards city's edge.

A tear rolled down her cheek, her brow furrowing and lip quivering.

_Roman!_

Tiny pebbles vibrated and shifted under her as the ground, the buildings, the sky, and her own face were painted the colours of violently-ejected, pluming fire that followed the great rumbling crash of the ship in the distance.

She clenched her fists harder as her tears began to flow, saliva catching in her throat as her chest constricted to oblivion; she found she couldn't quite swallow or breathe. 

_No._

_No._

Please _, no!_

A long wail overhead.

Two giant nevermores swam and circled in the flickering yellow sea above, their bodies casting crepuscular shadows that shifted with their nebulous forms. Instantly, her hand went to her mouth. Their baleful, blood-red orbs glowed even through the fiery hues and she could see them surveying this seemingly deserted corner of ruined human civilisation for the dread and sorrow to which they were drawn. 

She exhaled in to her hand, closing white eyes and exhaling softly in a bid to slow her breathing and quell the scrambling anxiety in herself. She needed to focus; fatalism would get her killed out here.

She turned her head downwards. When the iniquitous ravens wailed again, she thought of earlier times.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This section last updated on **10 December, 2019**
> 
> Originally meant to be but a section of a single chapter, this was reworked in to something of a prologue for impact's sake with the project's expansion. Subsequent writings are in the works, though my process—rife with musing on everything from how the plot shall progress to how I should feel while I write any given part—engenders hefty wait times.  
>    
>  That said, I would like to finish _Synecdoche_ before year's end. We shall see.


End file.
